the vast number of forensic arguments delivered by Mr. Webster in the course of his long career of superlative eminence at the bar, of all which only here and there a scattered specimen is preserved. We have felt and thought again and again, as we listened to speeches of his uttered in the prosecution of his ordinary professional business, that in all the qualities of mind and of elocution which characterize him, they were surpassed by none of his most celebrated orations in the Senate. Nay, the same vigorous grasp of analysis, the same clearness and force of conception, the same sagacity, penetration, and comprehensiveness, the same terseness and gravity of style relieved by the same felicity of illustration, which enlighten the debates of the Senate, we have seen exerted in the trial of great and complex causes at the bar, although on a narrower field, yet, as it seemed to us with even greater efficiency; since in the latter case his mind would not be engaged in the task of exposition merely, or of reply, as in parliamentary debate, but in the elucidation, analysis, and comparison of evidence, and in the keen protracted encounter of intellect with intellect striving for the verdict of the constitutional tribunal of the country.

Mr.

We will not dwell on this point, however; nor upon the several speeches in the volume of a political nature, delivered in public assemblies of the people. There is a passage, however, in one of them, to which we cannot forbear to revert. Webster is a native of New Hampshire. Sprung from a revolutionary stock, nurtured in the very domains of the mountaingoddess, liberty,' he rose to fame and usefulness in the bosom of his native State. So surely as the bright stars shall move on untiringly in their celestial paths on high to glad the eye and lead the footsteps of unborn generations of men, so surely as genius, honor, patriotism will continue to be prized on earth when the passions of the hour shall have fretted themselves into extinction and oblivion, so sure is it that the time will come, when New-Hampshire will esteem it her pride and her glory to have given birth and maturity to Daniel Webster. And yet such are the corruptions of party, and such the infamy to which it sometimes degrades the daily press, that, as Mr. Webster feelingly remarked in his speech at Concord, it has been his fortune, whether in public life or out of it, to be pursued by a degree of reproach and accusation in his native State, such as never fell to the lot of any other of her public men.

But we quit this ungrateful topic, for others more welcome

and acceptable. There are two speeches in this volume, among those of a miscellaneous character, which are of the same style, finish, and beauty with his most elaborate addresses, although delivered on less important or at least less stirring occasions. We allude to the speech pronounced at a public dinner given at New York in honor of Mr. Webster, and to another pronounced at Washington on the centennial birth-day of Washington. They contain pictures of the character of Hamilton, Jay, Livingston, Madison, and Washington, drawn with the same pencil of light, which sketched the eulogy of Adams and Jefferson; abounding, also, in passages of soul-inspiring patriotism and force. We extract a few paragraphs, in which these properties are strikingly conspicuous.

'Gentlemen, what I have said of the benefits of the Constitution to your City, might be said, with little change, in respect to every other part of the country. Its benefits are not exclusive. What has it left undone, which any government could do, for the whole country? In what condition has it placed us? Where do we now stand? Are we elevated, or degraded, by its operation? What is our condition under its influence, at the very moment when some talk of arresting its power and breaking its unity? Do we not feel ourselves on an eminence? Do we not challenge the respect of the whole world? What has placed us thus high? What has given us this just pride? What else is it, but the unrestrained and free operation of that same Federal Constitution, which it has been proposed now to hamper, and manacle, and nullify? Who is there among us, that, should he find himself on any spot of the earth, where human beings exist, and where the existence of other nations is known, would not be proud to say, I am an American? I am a countryman of Washington? I am a citizen of that Republic, which, although it has suddenly sprung up, yet there are none on the globe who have ears to hear, and have not heard of it-who have eyes to see and have not read of it-who know any thing, and yet do not know of its existence and its glory ?-And, gentlemen, let me now reverse the picture. Let me ask, who there is among us, if he were to be found to-morrow in one of the civilized countries Europe, and were there to learn that this goodly form of Government had been overthrown-that the United States were no longer united-that a death-blow had been struck upon their bond of Union-that they themselves had destroyed their chief good and their chief honor,-who is there whose heart would not sink within him? Who is there, who would not cover his face for very shame?'

'Gentlemen, the spirit of human liberty and of free government, nurtured and grown into strength and beauty in America, has stretched its course into the midst of the nations. Like an emanation from heaven, it has gone forth, and will not return void. It must change, it is fast changing, the face of the earth. Our great, our high duty, is to show, in our example, that this spirit is a spirit of health as well as a spirit of power; that its benignity is as great as its strength; that its efficiency to secure individual rights, social relations, moral order, is equal to the irresistible force with which it prostrates principalities and powers. The world, at this moment, is regarding us with a willing, but something of a fearful admiration. Its deep and awful anxiety is to learn, whether free states may be stable as well as free; whether popular power may be trusted as well as feared; in short, whether wise, regular, virtuous self-government is a vision, for the contemplation of theorists, or a truth established, illustrated, and brought into practice, in the country of Washington.

'Gentlemen, for the earth which we inhabit, and the whole circle of the sun, for all the unborn races of mankind, we seem to hold in our hands, for their weal or wo, the fate of this experiment. If we fail, who shall venture the repetition? If our example shall prove to be one, not of encouragement, but of terror-not fit to be imitated, but fit only to be shunned-where else shall the world look for free models? If this great Western Sun be struck out of the firmament, at what other fountain shall the lamp of Liberty hereafter be lighted? What other orb shall emit a ray to glimmer, even, on the darkness of the world?'

'Gentlemen, the political prosperity which this country has attained, and which it now enjoys, it has acquired mainly through the instrumentality of the present Government. While this agent continues, the capacity of attaining to still higher degrees of prosperity exists also. We have, while this lasts, a political life сараble of beneficial exertion, with power to resist or overcome misfortunes, to sustain us against the ordinary accidents of human affairs, and to promote, by active efforts, every public interest. But dismemberment strikes at the very being which preserves these faculties. It would lay its rude and ruthless hand on this great agent itself. It would sweep away, not only what we possess, but all power of regaining lost, or acquiring new possessions. It would leave the country, not only bereft of its prosperity and happiness, but without limbs, or organs, or faculties, by which to exert itself, hereafter, in the pursuit of that prosperity and happiness.

If

'Other misfortunes may be borne, or their effects overcome. disastrous war should sweep our commerce from the ocean, another generation may renew it; if it exhaust our treasury, future indus

tury may replenish it; if it desolate and lay waste our fields, still, under a new cultivation, they will grow green again, and ripen to future harvests. It were but a trifle, even if the walls of yonder Capitol were to crumble, if its lofty pillars should fall, and its gorgeous decorations be all covered by the dust of the valley. All these might be rebuilt. But who shall re-construct the fabric of demolished government? Who shall rear again the well proportioned columns of Constitutional liberty? Who shall frame together the skilful architecture which unites national sovereignty with State rights, individual security, and public prosperity? No, Gentlemen, if these columns fall, they will be raised not again. Like the Coliseum and the Parthenon, they will be destined to a mournful, a melancholy immortality. Bitterer tears, however, will flow over them, than were ever shed over the monuments of Roman or Grecian art; for they will be the remnants of a more glorious edifice than Greece or Rome ever saw-the edifice of Constitutional American liberty.'

We

Mr. Webster is in the full vigor of his life and faculties. trust that his country may long continue to enjoy the benefit of his unrivalled abilities and of his enlightened patriotism; and that his distinguished public career has not yet attained its zenith; since there is no station, which he would not honor and adorn. But, however this may be, his past services have secured for him the gratitude of his fellow-citizens; and he has reared already an everlasting monument of fame on the deep and broad foundation of tried patriotism. His exalted character, his eminent capacity for public usefulness, no longer belong to himself: they are an essential part of the glory and greatness of the American Union.

ARTICLE IX.

CRITICAL NOTICES.

1.-Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, etc. Brattleboro': Fessenden & Co.. Boston: Shattuck & Co. 1835. pp.

1275.

THIS volume is certainly an exception to the general style in which compends, summaries, and encyclopedias are manufactured among us. It bears the marks of care, honest research, and accurate statement. The commendable practice is followed of giving the authorities at the close of each article. It is not a bookselling-expedient, prepared with the haste of a plagiary from English works, but in part original, and in part condensed and accommodated to suit the general intention of the volume. We have looked over the whole work, and read many of the separate articles. No person would expect immaculate perfection in such a multifarious mass of facts pertaining to all ages and countries. It will be seen, however, that great credit is due to the proof-readers, as well as to the editor and his assistants, for the trust-worthiness and freedom from error which characterize the book. The original articles on the different Christian denominations, which are printed without alteration, were furnished by Messrs. J. G. Palfrey, Joseph Tracy, Daniel Sharp, Paul Dean, Samuel Miller, Alexander Campbell, J. V. Himes, L. R. Paige, T. F. Norris, Isaac Boyle, S. W. Wilson, J. D. Knowles, S. Beede, Charles Rockwell, and the editor of the volume, the Rev. J. N. Brown. In theology, the edition of Buck's Dictionary, which has lately been published with six hundred additional articles by Prof. Henderson of England, has been followed. The department of religious biography is very complete, a field of labor where the American Encyclopedia is notoriously deficient. Candor and good judgment are here manifested. To the account of each author, a list of his principal writings is generally appended. The Missionary Gazetteer is condensed from a previous edition, new articles added, and the whole brought down to the present time. As a Dictionary and Gazetteer of the Bible, the work will be found to be copious and accurate, special pains having been taken by VOL. VI. No. 19.

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